


A Long Story

by CatrinaSL



Series: Three Things [100]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Wonder Woman (2017)
Genre: Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Did I Mention Crack?, F/M, Fluff and Crack, Kissing, Missions, Missions Gone Wrong, Three Things, Time Loop, Time Travel, definitely crack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-27
Updated: 2018-02-27
Packaged: 2019-03-24 21:03:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13819401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CatrinaSL/pseuds/CatrinaSL
Summary: One thing that Bucky never told Steve after they were reunited was that on the day he fell he didn't hit the ground. At least not on the shore of the Danube. It's a long story.





	A Long Story

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Leeef](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leeef/gifts).



> Leeef prompted ☑ ☑ chickens, Stapler, Whip.
> 
> Thanks to SerialObsessor (ibelieveinturtles) and thestanceyg for their beta services! ♥
> 
> Disclaimer: CRACK. Also I have seen zero DC movies aside from Wonder Woman, so...

One thing that Bucky never told Steve after they were reunited was that on the day he fell he didn't hit the ground.

At least not on the shore of the Danube.

Instead, he jolted onto his feet in what looked like an office. He determined immediately that it was either a dream or he had died and gone to heaven; a woman stood before him, clad and gold and red, wielding a whip.

"Come, arm yourself," she commanded.

Bucky looked around but saw nothing more threatening than a stapler on a desk nearby. He picked it up, figuring that at the very least, throwing it would make a good distraction.

And then the woman said, "We must stop the chickens before they hatch their dastardly plan."

That's about when Bucky knew he was dreaming.

But it didn't matter; dreaming was better than being dead.

He and the woman searched the office building and found what indeed seemed to be chicken eggs. They were much larger than Bucky had expected, even with the oversized feather they had found in the elevator.

And they had already hatched.

"Not again," the woman sighed.

The room went foggy, filling with mist like the ravine over the river.

When it cleared, Bucky found himself on a street. It was late in the evening and the air was cold; his breath puffed out ahead of him. He turned, and spotted her walking down the sidewalk across the street, her shining armor gone, replaced instead with a furred coat and a scarf.

"Diana," he called, and waited for a car to pass before jogging over.

"Sergeant Barnes," she greeted, seeming unsurprised to see him as he fell into step beside her. "We failed last time. But I have pinpointed their location. If we can stop them, then we can stop  _ this _ ."

"What  _ is _ 'this?'" Bucky wanted to know.

The Princess of Themyscira frowned. "You fought at my side; you ought to understand already."

"Let's pretend I don't," Bucky replied, following her through a thick door and into what smelled like a brewery.

Diana put a finger to her lips and shed her coat, revealing the armor beneath. "It is a forced loop," she whispered as they inched forward down a hallway and into a larger room. "We are doomed to repeat this mission until we complete it. Although... I do appreciate that I'm no longer alone."

Bucky only had time to smile in reply, because they were suddenly attacked by a gigantic hen. 

For some reason this only excited Diana instead of disheartened her; she leaped onto its back with the aid of her whip and kept it distracted while she shouted at Bucky to break the eggs.

Bucky did his best; he spotted the huge eggs behind a brewing vat and broke four with the aid of the stapler (which he found in his pocket), but the fifth broke on its own. Hatched.

Diana was flung across the room by the hen as a  _ thing _ emerged from the last egg. "Not again," she groaned.

Mist.

* * *

 

Bucky had never really believed in time travel before he fell from the train, but he and Diana hunted gigantic chickens in Moscow in the 1980s, in the Forbidden City in 1502, and in what was surely the Australian Outback in who-knew-when. Sometimes Diana would be filled with energy and drive, and other times she would be despondent, convinced that they would never complete their mission.

They never had long to rest or plan, but over the various missions (that were of course the same one), Diana filled him in on what she knew. It wasn't much. She arrived several jumps before him and was attacked immediately by a hen protecting its eggs; while she was pinned down, Diana had watched the eggs hatch. She told Bucky that she was almost relieved that they were stuck in the time loop; at least they still had a chance to stop the terrifying things before they could escape to wreak havoc on the world.

Though they grew closer (to victory and to each other), they never got closer to completing their mission than that night in the Paris brewery.

* * *

Bucky's eyes cleared of mist. He was inside. On a couch. It was evening. He was comfortable. So was Diana.

Her head was pillowed against his shoulder, her legs draped across his lap, and their arms were around one another. A fire blazed in the fireplace in front of them, and for a moment, Bucky allowed himself to relax. They had been fighting for so long.

"What is this?" Diana asked, sitting up straighter.

Bucky rubbed her back with one hand, and dared to say, "A reprieve?"

Diana smiled, but it was distrustful. "Likely not."

"Be nice if it was, though, right?" Bucky asked.

Diana was so close. Bucky had never realized how captivating her eyes were.

"Yes," she replied, seeming to notice at the same time Bucky did that all either of them had to do was lean forward a little, and—

The hen crashed in through the front windows of the cabin with a screech. Diana turned her gaze from Bucky's lips to her whip, which was on a table on the other side of the room.

"Find the eggs!" she shouted, vaulting over the back of the couch for her weapon.

Bucky nodded and ran out the front door into the snow. Steam wafted through the air, and for a moment Bucky thought it was the mist again, but he squinted through it, spotting the eggs sitting safely in a large tub, which was the source of the steam.

He went after them with the stapler in his pocket, but only got through two before he heard Diana scream. As he hesitated over whether to go to her aid or to complete the mission, the familiar sound of an egg cracking itself split the air.

Bucky abandoned the once-again failed mission and ran inside to see Diana pinned down by the hen.

"Hey!" he shouted. "Pick on somebody your own size!"

It was an empty threat; Bucky was nowhere near as large as the hen was, but he let loose on it anyway, stapling it a few times before abandoning the ridiculous weapon and going after the beast with his fists.

"James!" Diana gasped. (It was the first time she'd called him that; usually it was just "Sergeant Barnes.") "The eggs!"

"You're more important," he yelled, as the hen whirled and came after him, freeing Diana at the same time.

He was a little busy for a minute, so he couldn't check to see if she was all right. When he finally did back the chicken into a corner of the cabin and look to where Diana had been, she was gone.

The next thing he knew, there was mist.

When he blinked it away, someone was calling his name.

But the voice was wrong.

Because it wasn't Diana.

It was Arnim Zola.

* * *

One thing that Bucky never told Steve after they were reunited was that on the day he fell he didn't hit the ground.

One thing that Hydra could never take from him were his dreams of Diana. And chickens.

Steve never asked  _ why _ he wanted to travel to all sorts of different places around the world. He just went along, happy to spend time with his best friend.

They visited China. Australia. France. Bucky found the brewery, now a Paris clothing shop. He bought a scarf the color of Diana's eyes and let Steve drag him off to an art museum.

And there she was.

"Diana."

She froze, then turned from a conversation she was engaged in and stared at him, her eyes wide.

"James?"

There was an embrace, and: "How did you get here? I thought you were..."

"I didn't know  _ what _ to think," Bucky told her. "But... I'm here now. And you're here."

Diana placed both hands on either side of his face, her eyes searching his. "It's really you," she decided.

Bucky grinned. "If I'd known you were in Paris, I would have come here first."

“What happened?” Diana asked

“I… went back to where I was before the mission,” Bucky told her. “How did we get out of the time loop?”

“I smashed the rest of the eggs while you distracted the beast,” Diana told him.

“But one was already hatching! I thought—”

"You thought  _ I _ was more important," Diana interrupted.

"You are," Bucky said.

Diana moved closer to brush her lips across Bucky's. "Thank you," she whispered. 

"For what?"

"For being with me. For fighting alongside me. For never giving up."

_ Never giving up _ . He hadn't; not while he was the Soldier, and not in his search for her.

He smiled. “You’re welcome.”

A movement out of the corner of his eye alerted Bucky to Steve's return. "Who's your friend?" Steve asked.

Diana laughed and Bucky sighed.

"It's a long story."

**Author's Note:**

> This is my 100th Three Things fic! You can celebrate by giving me a high five in the comments or on tumblr, or by prompting another Three Things fic!
> 
> [Prompt a Three Things fic!](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSf7S2MbkK0CxVHMG3kF8CD6fYqD0zwY-J6MqLb21nmFyRpE4w/viewform)
> 
> [Reblog on tumblr](http://catrinasl.tumblr.com/post/171355793768/a-long-story)
> 
> Tumblr: [catrinasl](http://catrinasl.tumblr.com)
> 
> Twitter: [@Catrina_SL](http://twitter.com/Catrina_SL)


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